Speaker 1: 0:06

Welcome to Finance Friends with Fabian, where we give our listeners an opportunity to be a part of our conversation with financial services industry leaders, hear their stories, the challenges they've overcome and the invaluable advice they have for anyone interested in the financial world. Keep up to date with us by following Finance Friends Podcast on Instagram and TikTok. Hello listeners. And today we have Stefan D'Alessandro. How are you going? I'm well. How are you? Very well, mate. Tell us a little bit about you, stefan. What do you do?

Speaker 2: 0:39

for work. I run a life insurance advice practice, so I mean you and I have a very, very long history. We worked together many, many years ago and since you, or since we parted ways, I was a financial advisor but now specialize only in risk, but we operate a general advice business. So it's general advice only, which is a little bit different to what people in financial services are used to, but I think it's got its place.

Speaker 3: 1:10

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 1:11

Fantastic. So for people that don't understand, what risk when you refer to risk, what is risk? What type of insurance are we talking about? So we're dealing personal insurances only.

Speaker 2: 1:21

So life TPD trauma cover, income protection. So protecting your assets, protecting any liabilities that you've got, in the event that something bad happens, We've got a strategy in place for you to be able to continue on with life. I mean, when something bad happens, it may not be continuing on in life at the same level it was before, but at least as a contingency plan in place. Yeah, personal insurance generally covers yeah, it's the the well.

Speaker 1: 1:49

The definition of risk is a chance of something going wrong, of course, so you're covering the chance of something going wrong. And the one thing that stood out to me when I started first working with you many moons ago was when, if someone from your life insurance company said to me you know what's currently your biggest asset? And I thought, well, my car is my biggest asset. It was a nice car, wasn't it? No well, it was probably about $5,000 back then. It was a nice car for me at the time. But the one thing that said, no, what your biggest asset is is your income, your ability to earn income.

Speaker 1: 2:25

Your ability to earn income, your ability to earn income over the next 40 years, say so, if you have an average income of $100,000 over 40 years, that's $4 million. Yeah, Okay, so that's your biggest. Your future income is your biggest asset at that point in my life, and it's crazy that you know some people young professionals won't ensure that earning ability or your future assets. So, anyway, let's touch base. So what do you actually do? Talk to us about your mechanics. What is the day-to-day of what you do?

Speaker 2: 2:57

Well, I mean, there's a little bit of a difference between what I used to do in the business and what we do now. So right now we actually only deal in general advice, a general advice only manner. So clients have to come to us and direct us in terms of what they want. We can educate them and provide them factual information only. Yeah, but that differs in terms of where it was when I was a full financial advisor, albeit specialing in life insurance, only because we were able to actually put strategies in place for them and give them recommendations. The thing that I found in this space of moving into the general advice space is that we're still able to empower clients to make the decisions for themselves.

Speaker 2: 3:38

I'm a big believer that risk, particularly in the full advice space, is a lot more complicated than it needs to be. So what we tried to do in pivoting the business model to a general advice model was put the decision making back in the client's hands. Yeah, give them the factual information that they need, um, but will empower them to work on their own levels of cover, the types of cover that they think that they need, and and then just facilitate that for them. So, in terms of the process, yeah, clients will come to us, we'll give them an idea as to what the types of cover are, direct them to some ways that they can potentially calculate their own levels of cover. There's stuff on you know, the Money, smart and whatnot that they can actually use. And then they come to us and say you know, can you give us a market comparison on this, that and the other? And we just we act on on their instructions.

Speaker 2: 4:28

Basically, yeah, once that once they've decided on what they want, we go away and we can actually put that in place for them. Yeah, but, um, yeah, that's it's. It's a little bit different to the full advice model, but I actually think there's a. There's a real niche. The the reason behind that as well. The other reason behind doing what we did was I was finding, with the cost to serve under the full advice model, I was having to knock back clients who were younger yeah, and they tend to need the cover more like you wouldn't.

Speaker 2: 4:59

You're getting married and you're starting a family, still relatively young. Yeah, cost is obviously a big issue. We get paid on commissions but then charging an advice fee on that was obviously. It's not feasible for a lot of people.

Speaker 3: 5:13

Yep.

Speaker 2: 5:13

So the ability for us to serve those clients by reducing our cost to serve means that I'm actually able to help more people get cover.

Speaker 1: 5:22

Yeah, and that's the thing that came out of the Royal Commission was the cost to deliver advice increased, and now it's arguably the people that need financial advice the most can't afford it yeah. I think so, unless, obviously you just mentioned, you can reduce your cost to serve through a generalist advice model or general advice model and you're able to give advice to, like you said, younger professionals or younger families that need assistance with risk insurance.

Speaker 2: 5:57

Yeah, because we can't actually give the advice, we can still facilitate an outcome for them. So, like I've said to a lot of people, it's not for everybody. There are people who really need the hand held through the process and we've got the means to refer them out to a couple of full advice holistic advice partners that can help them. But reducing cost to serve was obviously a big thing following the Royal Commission, so it was just costing a fortune to deliver advice.

Speaker 2: 6:24

I'm a big believer in technology, so our process and and our service delivery is actually pretty tight as it was, but then pivoting as well to that ga model suited us. It suited my clients too. So, yeah, I'm actually able to spend more time speaking to them as, as opposed to doing back office stuff and or having to increase headcount in order to be able to facilitate that. I had no headcount sort of philosophy when I set the business up. I didn't want to hire anyone. I thought I'll invest in technology instead, and it's worked pretty well. So it's just me in the business and it works.

Speaker 1: 6:59

For me it works. It's not for everybody, but it does work. That's great. It's the end of the day. It it's not for everybody, but it does work. That's great. It's the end of the day, it's your business and it's what works for you. Yeah, so that's fantastic. And what does a typical day look like in the life of Stefan D'Alessandro at the Risk Lab?

Speaker 2: 7:12

When I'm not on the golf course, I'm not doing the work. So I suppose when I set the business up, I had a really strong philosophy that I wanted to create some balance for me in life. I wanted to be able to create some time to be able to do things that are rewarding to me and then, obviously, that would put me in a mental space that I'm able to, when it's time to work, focus. So a typical day for me would now just involve undertaking reviews, dealing with business partners who refer business to us and, yeah, I mean I've got a pretty good balance. Admin-wise, things are fairly automated now, which is pretty cool.

Speaker 2: 7:59

And yeah, it's given me a lot of freedom, operating this way, to do what I want and actually go and meet with potential business partners who are looking to refer the risk out.

Speaker 2: 8:12

They don't want to particularly do it, refer clients out that you know that's not in their wheelhouse and I operate in a pretty niche space, so there's a lot of things that are in my wheelhouse as well. So there's a lot of opportunities to deal with potential business partners. And then the rest of the time I'm either on the phone or on Zoom speaking to clients.

Speaker 1: 8:29

Yeah, and that's what I want to do. And what do you most enjoy about your job?

Speaker 2: 8:36

Dealing with my clients. Speaking to people. Speaking to people, I mean I like the whole concept behind trying to get things done with as little cost to serve means that I can actually build relationships.

Speaker 1: 8:48

Yeah, Spend more time building relationships rather than on administration, Because there is a lot of. When you are a holistic advisor providing personal advice, the documentation that comes with that is a lot. Advice the documentation that comes with that is a lot. In some cases, I've heard over 100 pages to deliver a statement of advice, which is a financial plan for a client, which is what you think is ludicrous.

Speaker 2: 9:13

Oh well, yeah, Look, I don't have an opinion on it. One way or the other, it's just not for me. So I would rather spend time talking to my clients and getting to know them and making sure that they feel a level of care because I do care about them, as opposed to, yeah, dealing on more of the back office things. I've set that up in a really good way that I think it's really compliant. Nothing can slip through the cracks in the way that we've set things up and now I can focus on them so they get more touch than they were before. I'm calling them more often, we're able to market to them more often, speak to them more often, so I think that the overall service in terms of what they see and what they feel is actually better than I was the way that I was operating before.

Speaker 1: 10:02

Yeah fantastic and maybe it would be good to share your experience to get to where you are today. Obviously you spoke about, because you've got quite an interesting background. We met quite a few years ago. I think, yeah, I'm trying to think when.

Speaker 2: 10:17

Maybe 2010?, I reckon earlier than that, I think, we started working together. I reckon it was oh eight, yeah, yeah, a long while ago. A long time ago we were young bucks.

Speaker 1: 10:26

Yeah, we were young bucks and you taught me most of what I knew in my career, so thank you to that. But you started because you were studying. What were you studying when you first finished high school?

Speaker 2: 10:40

So I did computer science at Swinburne, which is a far cry from financial services, but worked in a family business after I finished school.

Speaker 2: 10:51

Family financial services business yeah they did financial planning, mortgage broking. So I think working in there and the skill set that I had from you know, obviously the computing background naturally gravitated towards staying in the family business and then I was really lucky in terms of being able to be empowered to implement some of the you know, the technological solutions that I'd sort of learnt along the way within that business. So benefits from both sides. I was obviously lucky enough to implement a lot of tech stuff that I'd sort of learnt along the way within that business. So benefits from both sides. I was obviously lucky enough to implement a lot of tech stuff that I really loved. I'm really passionate about that. So I operate another business in that space.

Speaker 2: 11:30

We've got a digital agency with one of my best mates and we guinea pig everything on the Risk Lab, which is good, because if it breaks it's on me, but the ability to do that in that business while learning the skills, and then eventually just I transitioned over to being a financial planner because it was just, it made more sense in terms of career direction or whatnot. Then we met along the way. I suppose, yeah, we worked together for about what? Five years, I'd say, yeah, close to you, taught me a fair bit, don't worry.

Speaker 1: 12:01

Close to yeah. And then from there.

Speaker 2: 12:03

I mean I'd cultivated a fairly large client base within that business and then natural course of progression for me was I wanted to set up something for myself. Yeah, fantastic, so I brought those clients and set them up under the Risk Lab. And here we are today.

Speaker 1: 12:18

Yep. So for any listeners that might be, you know what might be considering insurance for them or their family who would be your ideal client. Do you have an ideal client? Or, because your cost to serve is is relatively low, you can on board and your processes are very, you know, um, I guess Streamline Streamline is the right word. Is there anyone that's listening who should come and speak to you?

Speaker 2: 12:52

Well, look, ideal client for me is somebody who is sort of willing to take on calculation of their own cover themselves, so take the reins and say this is what I think I want. In terms of demographic, there really isn't one. I prefer to deal with clients who are sort of young and growing families, because that's when the trigger point, when you have kids, I think your mentality shifts. So, growing up it's like you know, you and I grew up together. I didn't have a family or a wife and you kind of feel invincible. So I never used to speak to my mates about what I did because, to be honest with you, I didn't want to sell or push that onto them. Naturally, I think what happens is you start to get married and have kids and they end up coming to you going hey, I've got kids now and I've got usually a mortgage it's usually a big one as well and they want to make sure that they can protect against, protect themselves in the event that something happens.

Speaker 1: 13:44

Protect their families ultimately, yeah, and it's also about protecting their family.

Speaker 2: 13:47

Yeah, I think, particularly as blokes, we kind of think we'll be right. Yeah, that Aussie mentality.

Speaker 2: 13:53

Yeah and then you know someone comes along and then you've got little ones come along and you think, well, I'll be right, but I don't know what will happen if something does happen, so that you have to kind of look out for them. So I mean ideal client, as long as there's somebody who sees a need to protect themselves or protect their loved ones, that's enough for me to be able to work with them. But if you really want to dig deeper, I suppose those young and growing families are the ones that I'm looking to deal with, because they've got a longer-term protection strategy in place as well.

Speaker 1: 14:27

Yeah, and what would be the top two or three most important skills to be successful in your role?

Speaker 2: 14:41

Well, I think you need to be able to cultivate relationships and you need to be able to have a level of compassion so that people understand that you actually give a stuff. But it's interpersonal relationships. That's probably the main skill. I think there's just a level of expectation these days that you know what you're talking about anyway.

Speaker 3: 15:01

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 15:01

So I don't know, I think that's kind of I wouldn't say a a level of expectation these days that you know what you're talking about anyway. Yeah, so I don't know, I think that's kind of I wouldn't say a rite of passage, but it's just an expectation You've got to know what you're talking about.

Speaker 2: 15:09

But the most important skill is whether or not you can develop that relationship on people where they'll actually trust you enough to be able to facilitate what they want and then trust you on an ongoing basis to be able to speak to you about it, and when things change, come back to you and whatnot.

Speaker 2: 15:24

That would be the single most important skill. Outside of that, it comes probably to a little bit of a technical base, but I think again, I think that's part of the course. You've just got to know what you're doing if you're going to be in this industry or this profession, yeah, I guess with any profession you. You've been doing this now for 20 years oh yeah, yes, 19 years, yeah, a few years, a long time. It makes me sound like a long time I know you're not, you're only 60.

Speaker 1: 15:53

I feel it sometimes, um, and what's like. I think setbacks is important, right, because you you're obviously challenging the status quo with what you're doing and you do an exceptional job and credit to you. But what setbacks have you had in your career that come to mind, and what advice would you give to anyone that maybe wants to become a risk specialist?

Speaker 2: 16:19

I'd find it really funny if someone woke up and said I want to do risk, I want to be a risk specialist. I'd find it really funny if someone woke up and said I want to do risk, I want to be a risk specialist, because it wasn't my choice. I always say nobody wakes up in the morning and says, hey, I want to do life insurance advice. I naturally just gravitated towards it because we saw it in play, working really, really early in my career. It was in the first six months and we were handling a couple of trauma claims. So I saw the effect that it had on the families when we actually were able to facilitate something for them. That was life-changing. But yeah, it's a really good question. In terms of setbacks, though, I think I don't think there's been too many personal setbacks. I think the setbacks have come from circumstance within our sort of space. So the Royal Commission obviously changed a lot of things.

Speaker 2: 17:08

There's been changes to remuneration. There's always uncertainty about where the space is at overall and I think that's changed the mentality. Like the whole thing about the cost to serve increasing dramatically was a definite setback in terms of strategically where we were heading in terms of the family business at the time. So having to pivot to a different model I don't know if you'd call that a setback, but it definitely had us pivot for a specific reason. But outside of that there's not too many things that I'd consider setbacks. It's just sometimes bad stuff happens and you've just got to deal with it and pivot. So bad stuff happens all the time in business.

Speaker 2: 17:54

Yeah, exactly right, I think they're learning experiences rather than setbacks.

Speaker 1: 17:58

I agree, and that's a good mindset to have, and I always say there's no such thing as a bad day, just an opportunity to learn. That's it and I think, the one thing that I've been running my business with recruitment for coming into five years now. I just need to get comfortable with being uncomfortable.

Speaker 2: 18:16

Yeah, it's been five years Almost. Yeah, Well done.

Speaker 1: 18:20

Five years, in January so two months Big party. Well, I probably party a bit too much as it is. I need a rain head in a little bit.

Speaker 2: 18:32

I'll wait for my invite though Two months. All right, I'll put in a diary.

Speaker 1: 18:34

Yeah, two months. No, maybe we'll just play a round of golf.

Speaker 2: 18:37

That might be a big round.

Speaker 3: 18:39

Yeah, go for a run. Yeah, go for a run. You're doing your late 30s, yeah that's 37.

Speaker 1: 18:44

I'd say he's mid 30s. Okay, we'll be kind to each other, that's fine. Um, what about you? Tell us a little bit about you personally. We've spoken about age. You're a big Richmond supporter, yep?

Speaker 2: 18:59

You want to talk about Richmond now.

Speaker 1: 19:00

You've waited until 2024 to talk about Richmond. Well, I only started the podcast recently. Who knows? You've got a lot of draft picks coming up. Yeah, I know.

Speaker 2: 19:10

I haven't been looking forward to the draft for a long time, but now we definitely are. Yeah, in terms of me, well, you'd know I'm a big sports fan, so I'll watch any sport, I'll play just about any sport. I play soccer, love my Premier League, love the Reds. They're doing quite well at the moment.

Speaker 1: 19:27

The top of the table at the moment. Top of the table. Five points clear.

Speaker 2: 19:35

Exactly, exactly, and the big Arnie Slott is doing very well. Yeah, I mean, I love my sport, I love my mates, I love my family. I like keeping fit.

Speaker 3: 19:40

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 19:44

And yeah, I'm having a lot of fun at the moment. I've got a six and a. She says a six and a quarter, six and a half-year-old at home. She's keeping me pretty. I don't know, some days she's keeping me, keeping me pretty.

Speaker 2: 19:56

I don't know, someday she's keeping me young, but other days she's making me feel really old, yeah, but though again you talk about the what my day looks like. A lot of the way that I've set the business up was around the fact that, like we've got one child, we're only having one child, and I don't want to miss that. So a lot of what I do gives me the ability to be really involved with her life.

Speaker 3: 20:15

Yeah.

Speaker 2: 20:16

And I love that, Like I don't want to miss anything She'll have if she's got assembly at school. I want to be there. So pickups, drop-offs, anything that I can do to be really involved and enjoy that journey I want to, and the business has given me a lot of opportunity to make that happen.

Speaker 1: 20:31

And that's great that you've got that flexibility as well.

Speaker 2: 20:34

Yeah, and it comes down to even going out and having a round of golf, like we were talking about pre-podcast. I want to be able to do that and take clients out, take friends out, enjoy life, because I think it goes quick, definitely does.

Speaker 1: 20:49

Definitely does, and you recently ran a marathon. I did my first marathon, the Gold Coast.

Speaker 2: 20:51

Congratulations, I think the party afterwards was actually my first marathon, the Gold Coast Congratulations. I think the party afterwards was actually harder than the race, to be honest, and I'm doing my next. We're doing an ultra marathon in February with a couple of my best mates down at Brimbank and probably get the Gold Coast done again next year. What distance are you doing for the ultra? It's 47 or 48. Is that an?

Speaker 1: 21:14

organized ultra.

Speaker 2: 21:15

Yeah, it's a backyard ultra, so they do. You've got to do a six-kilometer loop at Brimbank within an hour. Whatever time you do it in within the hour, you get the rest of it at rest. The rest of that time is rest time and you go again.

Speaker 2: 21:31

So you've got to do seven loops to get to the 42 and you can do an eighth to make sure that it's. It's an ultra. So it starts at like seven at night on a friday and it finishes, I think, in three in the morning. And then then there's the guy. It's a last man standing event, so I'm only doing the limited one but yeah my big big benson, that yeah yeah, he's six foot seven, absolute weapon of an athlete and very inspiring to us.

Speaker 1: 21:53

So he just did an Ironman on the weekend.

Speaker 2: 21:55

He did yeah, and he's done this backyard ultra. He did 123 kilometres before he clocked out.

Speaker 3: 22:00

So he could work for over 24 hours which is cool, my gosh.

Speaker 2: 22:05

I don't know how he's bailed me into doing it, but he has. I like to have something booked in from a fitness point of view so that I can, you know it sort of underpins where I'm at for training and just keeping fresh. I feel like if you don't, it's like a holiday. If you don't have a holiday booked in, you've got nothing to look forward to.

Speaker 1: 22:21

Yeah, I think that's really important. So the fitness thing for me it's like have an event booked in to train for yeah, and it keeps me in line, yeah and I think it's interesting because we've now recorded quite a few podcasts and for very successful business owners or professionals, the key theme is and maybe it's just me, because what's important to me and the people I hang around, but you know fitness is really important.

Speaker 2: 22:52

Do you think it's an age thing? Do you think it's a shift in the mentality of where we're at as a society? Because fitness was obviously not a big thing while I was in my 20s otherwise I would have been playing some soccer.

Speaker 1: 23:04

Yeah, but you obviously were playing soccer.

Speaker 3: 23:06

Yeah.

Speaker 1: 23:07

So, you played quite a lot. You still play twice a week.

Speaker 2: 23:11

We still play futsal twice a week. I've played futsal since I was 12 and I played outdoor for a few years, but nothing high level from an outdoor point of view. But I just feel like, particularly the running thing. I wonder whether it's a life stage thing or just people in general are running more.

Speaker 1: 23:26

Maybe you build a little bit more resilience as you get older, so you know running longer distance. You don't just tap out after a K, yeah.

Speaker 2: 23:34

I, so you know, running longer distance you don't just tap out after a K. Yeah, I actually took my daughter for her first park run on the weekend and I was really surprised she got through a whole kilometre before she started to stop and complain. She did the whole thing, yeah, but that first kilometre I thought she's either going to get it, that's impressive.

Speaker 2: 23:47

I was very impressed for someone who doesn't run and she wants to go back next week, and I think maybe it's just a shift in the mentality in terms of society. Now People are getting out and doing more in terms of health and fitness or there's more options available. I don't remember there being park run when I was six.

Speaker 1: 24:02

No well, my parents. I try and get my parents out for a walk and we go there for dinner afterwards and mum's like I can't be bothered.

Speaker 2: 24:09

We're just a walk. Yeah, I know Well, it's just a walk. Yeah, I know Well, we do run club on a Sunday night with the boys, which everybody thinks is a bit crazy to run at 8.30 at night. But for me that underpins the end of a good weekend and it sets you up for the start of, hopefully, a good week. At least you've done something positive to end and start each week?

Speaker 1: 24:31

Yeah, agree, no, that's really important. Well, thank you for coming on pleasure mate. Finance friends with fabian pleasure, each other for a long time and classify you as one of my good mates yeah, absolutely so. Thank you anytime and look forward to releasing that and listen to um this podcast, and if you want to get into contact with stephan, we'll share his details through our podcast and our socials and I I'll wait for that invite, that five-year invite. Yeah, in a couple of months' time. Thanks, mate.

Speaker 3: 25:01

Disclaimer this podcast exists for informational and entertainment purposes only. The personal opinions of the speaker and guests do not represent the view of any other party. If this recording contains reference to financial products, that reference does not constitute advice nor recommendations and may not be relied upon.